March 28, 2023

CRB names 2 new executives, creates new group

CRB, a global provider of sustainable engineering, architecture, construction, and consulting solutions to the biopharmaceutical and food and beverage industries, has named two new top executives.

Ryan Schroeder, previously company president, has been named CEO by the company’s board of directors, while Sam Kitchell is the new chief operating officer of the newly formed CRB Operations, a group uniting the company’s regional operations and technical operations teams.

Ryan Schroeder is CRB’s new CEO. Photo: CRB

Schroeder succeeds former CEO and CRB co-founder Jeff Biskup, who will remain as the board’s executive chair. He joined CRB in 1987 as an architectural engineer and become leader of CRB’s Midwest region in 2010. He was named company president in 2017 and has presided over unprecedented growth, including CRB’s first $1 billion-plus revenue years in 2021 and 2022.

CRB, with 21 offices and nearly 1,800 employees across Europe and North America, provides manufacturing facilities that deliver medicinal therapies and vaccines as well as many brand-name food, beverage and pet food products. Its project portfolio includes numerous large-scale, award-winning biopharmaceutical and food and beverage projects.

“Following in Jeff’s footsteps as CEO carries extra meaning for me,” Schroeder said in a news release. “He’s been an incredible mentor from the day I arrived at CRB, and his devotion to successful client outcomes is unmatched. I will continue to lean on his leadership, experience and instincts as we guide CRB well into the future.”

Kitchell previously led the company’s emerging business operations group. He has more than 25 years of experience in the pharmaceutical and biotech industries.

Also, CRB has named Ryan Thompson as its new Industry 4.0 lead. Thompson has nearly two decades of experience driving digital transformation within CRB’s core markets.

The 4.0 movement enables digital transformation for companies, implementing technologies that reduce costs, increase capacity, improve time-to-market and drive more accurate and quicker decision making for manufacturers.





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